I, Leviathan
by Dragonofshadows115
Summary: Harry Potter had always loved the water. This is a tale of what might happen, were Harry the heir to a legacy older than humanity and greater and more terrible than the very gods themselves. Rated for descriptions. AU.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N:** This is my first proper fanfiction here, so if anyone who takes the time to read this could take another minute or two to write me a review and help me improve, that would be more than appreciated. I'm mainly writing this to get some practice in with short stories and concise writing before I start out properly on my novel project, so any help with improving my writing style would be met with open arms. I'm more than willing to offer help in return.

Next, some of the material in this story is based off of The Kings Raven's World of Darkness fansplat Leviathan: the Tempest and if you recognise anything from there, it's not mine. Mind you, I am taking some liberties with it, so don't expect it to be identical (for one, it won't be quite as grimdark).

This work had not been betaed, although I have done my best to pick up any spelling and grammar errors.

Finally, I own neither Leviathan nor Harry Potter. If I owned the former, I would be working on it instead of my own fansplat and if I owned the latter, this would not be fanfiction. Logic.

* * *

Harry Potter had always loved water.

While his parents were still alive, they took him weekly to the swimming centre in the next town over from their cottage at Godric's Hollow and watched him splash around in the pool, seemingly more at home in the water than out of it. They developed a suspicion that he have an extremely strong magical affinity to water, but had no opportunity to find the answer, considering their murder within their own home only a scant few weeks after Lily Potter formulated her theory.

Later, after the wand of the Dark Lord Voldemort was discovered in the Potters' nursery (nestled atop a pile of stinking seaweed on the saltwater-flooded floor in front of his crib) and the scar in the shape of a lightning bolt on his head caused him to be touted as the hero of the wizarding world, his foster family, the Dursleys, took him swimming with their own son. They did this more out of fear that one of the neighbours would hear him crying while there were no adults in the house, but they took him nonetheless.

They did not do it again. This was because within a minute of climbing into the pool in his boxers – the Dursleys not wanting to spend good money on swimming nappies or trunks – he was giggling merrily and joyfully splashing around, while the water swirled around him like a playful puppy. They snatched him from the water and never returned to that pool again. They thanked their lucky stars that they had gone a couple of towns over and prayed that the gossip did not spread to Little Whinging.

Denied the chance to swim, the young Harry made the most of whatever contact with water that he could, luxuriating in the short baths and showers that his aunt gave him every couple of weeks when he began to smell too much.

When he was old enough – by the Dursleys' reckoning of five years old – to work in the garden, he looked forwards to the days when the sky was overcast and wept its rainy tears upon him, cooling him and running over his skin beneath his baggy, second hand clothes. Sometimes, when he had some time when he was neither gardening not cleaning nor cooking not doing whatever miscellaneous chore his relatives devised, he would sit outside in the rain and look up into the curtains of falling droplets. Occasionally, he would see patterns or shapes in the rain, patterns which made him think of great sinuous creatures, curling and writhing in the air. Then he would blink and they would be gone, but the feeling remained. A feeling of being regarded and approved of, as if he had accomplished something by seeing them.

Harry wondered if that was what having parents felt like.

* * *

Magic was difficult for Harry. It wasn't so much that it was difficult to use, just difficult to be around. It was like a discordant sound, a warped bell ringing in his ears or like a too-bright light. He didn't like the feel of it, but it was better than the hateful stares and slaps he got from the Dursleys and the big man, Hagrid, was nice and liked him and brought him a birthday cake, so he went with him through the barrier at the back of the run-down Leaky Cauldron and followed him into Diagon Alley.

The goblins at Gringotts Bank had been strange and had looked at him strangely as well, as if they could see something in him that set him apart from the others in the great marble hall of the bank. He was glad when they went underground, partly because there were no more goblins – except Griphook – to stare at him and partly because the magic down here was different, somehow. It was bigger, slower and resounded in his bones like a great, throbbing heartbeat. Instead of giving him a headache with its not-quite-brightness, it comforted him with an enveloping warmth and darkness, like a great blanket. He hardly even registered Hagrid stopping the cart to take a small item from an otherwise empty vault and only snapped out of his comforted stupor to marvel at the piles of gold in his trust vault and to gather up a few handfuls of the enormous coins to put in the pouch that Griphook handed him with a sharp-toothed smile.

The wizard in the wand shop, Ollivander, was quite strange, even by what Harry had seen of wizards so far. He pottered around his shop, taking one wand after another, thrusting them into Harry's hands, only to tear them away a second later, muttering under his breath about 'awkward children' and 'core-length-phlogiston channel differentials'. Eventually, he reverently placed a wand which he declared to be 11 inches, made of holly and with a core of phoenix feather in the boy's hand, before looking utterly mystified when it twisted itself up and cracked the moment it touched his skin, as if it was wringing itself out.

Eventually, he settled Harry with a 7 inch wand of intertwined ivy and sequoia wood. He explained that the core of the wand was one of the heartstrings of an aspidochelone, an enormous shelled whale known for tricking sailors into landing upon its back and then drowning them. He warned that the wand was, although powerful, likely to be stubborn and opinionated, before charging the young wizard 10 Galleons for the wand and the rare materials used in its construction. The wand felt good in his hand, like it belonged there. He left Ollivander's shop with the old wandmaker's last pronouncement ringing in his ears.

"I think that you will accomplish great things, Mr. Potter. Although I'm not so sure that you'll need my wares to do so."

* * *

After enduring a last few weeks with the Dursleys and a bit of a fiasco trying to find the entrance to Platform 9 ¾ (he eventually located it by listening to the off-note that the magic of the barrier struck in his head), Harry boarded the Hogwarts Express, a train pulled by a garishly red steam locomotive. He arrived at the castle some hours later, having had the peace and quiet of his claimed compartment violated by over a dozen people. First, a redhead named Ron Weasley had barged in and demanded to see his scar, before being laughed out by a platinum-blond who proclaimed himself to be Draco Malfoy, a Personage Of Quality. He eventually left the compartment after being ignored in favour of watching the rain outside, as did his two minions, Crabbe and Goyle, apparently.

After being led away from Hogsmeade Station by the same Hagrid who had helped him around Diagon Alley, Harry was delighted to learn that Hogwarts was situated next to a lake, unimaginatively called the Black Lake. He wondered if students were allowed to swim in it.

The castle itself was at once beautiful and horrible to Harry. It looked magnificent, its many lighted windows picking it out against the dark sky. It stood like the spiked crown of some entombed giant-king, a millennial guardian over the lands surrounding it and the lake in its shadow. To his newly-dubbed 'magic-sense', though, the castle was horrific, even from just at the door. It seemed to sing in a thousand discordant tones, each loud enough to rattle his bones and together making him want to cover his ears to block it out, although he knew that that would do nothing to help. He only hoped that he would become accustomed to it, as he had to the magic of his school things. He hoped it happened soon.

The Sorting Ceremony which so many of the other first years seemed to be fretting over turned out to consist of putting a talking hat on one's head and letting it shout out what house you were going to be in. After a small hiccup during which the hat commented that the inside of his head was quite uncomfortable for it, it sorted Harry into Gryffindor House, the house of the brave and the reckless. Also the house where his parents went, if the ha was to be believed.

Between learning to turn beetles into buttons and levitate feathers, the at once suspicious and adoring stares of the rest of the student population and viciously difficult Potions homework, time passed swiftly at Hogwarts. The first major incident happened on the night of Halloween, when a troll appeared in the school, announced by the stuttering Defence Against the Dark Arts professor, Quirinus Quirrel. Harry lived up to his House, going to fetch the bookish Hermione Granger who had not come to the Halloween feast after Ron Weasley's hurtful words to her leaving Charms. Unfortunately, it turned out that the troll was in fact on the second floor, not in the dungeons where Professor Quirrel had claimed it to be. It had cornered Hermione in a bathroom and, in desperation to stop it, Harry had pointed his wand at it and shouted the first thing which came to mind.

To anyone else, the syllables would have been sibilant and unpleasant to hear and the magic that erupted from his wand and enveloped the troll would have been like swamp-filth and broken glass on the skin, entwined with unfathomable cold and awful pressure. To Harry, it just felt right, as if this was the magic he should have been using all along. It burrowed into the troll's body like writhing worms or the pseudopodia of an amoeba, uncaring for the troll's magically-resistant skin. It permeated its flesh, turning its blood to putrid seawater and filling its lungs with filth and alien bacteria. It collapsed, coughing up water and slime. Harry grabbed Hermione's hand and ran back to Gryffindor Tower, tasting blood in his mouth. He never realised that it was from his own teeth, which had become needle-like and pointed, puncturing his gums. By the time he reached his dorm, they had receded again, leaving only ordinary, human, teeth in his mouth.

Following the incident with the troll, Harry struck up a firm friendship with Hermione. The two formerly-lonely children found solace in one another's company, even if Hermione sometimes irritated him with her insistence upon the following of rules and excessive study time and him her with his obsessive love of water. The teachers concluded that the troll must have got on the bad end of one of the castle's many wards and protections, for after all, what child could cast a spell powerful enough to kill a full-grown mountain troll?

The rest of the year passed mostly without incident. Hagrid's hut burnt down at one point and there were rumours that it was a baby dragon that started the fire. Professor Quirell vanished only a few weeks before the end of the year. Nothing was ever heard of him again.

* * *

At first, the summer between Harry's first and second years at Hogwarts was excellent for Harry. Although the Dursleys still made him do the chores around the house, he now had a room of his own and a way to keep them from doing anything too outrageous, in the form of a threat of magic. It did not matter that he could not actually follow through with his threats, but the Dursleys did not know about the Decree for the Reasonable Restriction of Underage Sorcery.

Unfortunately, the state of affairs did not last. Only a few weeks into the summer, during an important business meeting for his uncle, a small, wrinkled creature wearing a soiled pillowcase and with long ears, drooping ears popped into existence in his bedroom. It asserted that its name was Dobby and that it was a house elf. It also made clear – between banging its head on the walls and wailing about the 'Great Harry Potter – that Harry was not to return to Hogwarts, because terrible danger was brewing there. Naturally, he refused. The wretched elf then got it into his head to expose Harry's deception of his relatives by hovering the expensive dessert that Petunia had made for the guests over to them and then exploding it in their faces. This would have been enough of a problem by itself but the true damage was done later, when a letter from the Department of Magical Law Enforcement arrived and exposed the fact that one deliberate act of magic by Harry would see him expelled from Hogwarts and his wand broken.

A viciously joyful smile spread across the young wizard's uncle Vernon's face at this. He had sent Harry to his room and installed bars on the window and locks and a cat flap in the door. The rest of the summer was spent in abject misery, as he was trapped in his room, allowed out only to go to the toilet once a day and fed only on canned food pushed through the cat flap. Unable to use magic to escape or get a message out to Hermione for help, Harry made the best of his situation. He feverishly studied the school books that his uncle had left him with, becoming intimately familiar with theories of magic, courtesy of Adalbert Waffling and the myriad creatures that inhabited the magical world, thanks to Fantastic Beasts and Where To Find Them. He memorised the different potions and ingredients detailed in One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi and Magical Draughts and Potions. By the time he was eventually released by the ill-tempered potions professor who came to investigate his conspicuous absence at the Welcoming Feast, Harry Potter was well-read beyond all but the most studious of Ravenclaws his age.

On his return to Hogwarts – and the deathly worried Hermione – Harry was quite different to how he had been a year previously. He spent hours at a time on the weekends swimming in the Black Lake, having finally secured permission from his head of house, Minerva McGonagall. At first he wove warming charms around himself, but he quickly discovered that the cold of the lake did not seem to bother him as it did others. He was more withdrawn with all but his closest friends (Hermione being the only individual belonging to that particular denomination) and threw himself into his studies. He discovered, through long conversations and practice with the diminutive charms teacher, Flitwick, that he had a flair and talent for enchantment that was rarely seen. He also began to see an improvement in his transfiguration abilities. The process of changing matter, warping it into a new shape, simply seemed to come easily to him. The thing that bothered Harry the most in the new school year was the new DADA teacher, one Gilderoy Lockhart. The man was a fraud, it was plain to see. Even his devout fans among the students began to doubt him after a few weeks of being taught by him.

On Halloween, again, the peaceful rhythms of his year were interrupted. The caretaker's cat, Mrs. Norris, was found petrified beneath a bloody message declaring THE CHAMBER HAS BEEN OPENED. ENEMIES OF THE HEIR BEWARE. Suspicion ran rampant throughout the school, rumours and accusations spreading and burning themselves out like wildfires. It was professor Snape said some, before they were drowned out by those who claimed that Slytherin's ghost had returned and was acting through his monster to complete the eradication of muggleborns within the school.

Harry and Hermione largely ignored the turmoil over the message, preferring to investigate Harry's new talents, as well as his newfound ability to speak in parseltongue, the language of snakes, and to the merpeople which lived in the depths of the Black Lake. They were largely untouched by the crisis. Until another student was petrified. And then another. The two friends began researching creatures capable of petrification, but only as an idle hobby of sorts.

That lasted until Hermione was petrified.

With the loss of his friend, something awoke within the young wizard. A terrible determination overcame him and he spent nearly all of his time attempting to discover the identity of the creature. With the eventual realisation of the creature's nature as a basilisk and the location of the entrance to the Chamber of Secrets – gleaned from interrogating the ghosts which roamed the castle and one Moaning Myrtle in particular – he prepared to bring Hell down upon the monster with a hatred rarely found in adults twice his age. He went down the hole beneath the sink with a grim expression on his face and his wand clutched tightly in his hand. In his chest he could feel something cold and horrible where he imagined his heart would be. It wasn't courage, but the cold hatred and diamond-hard will would do.

After making his way through first a cavern full of bones and an enormous snakeskin and then, after going through an immense door inlaid with reliefs depicting an enormous pair of entwined serpents, he arrived in a long hall flanked by great stone snakes leading towards an enormous depiction of what he assumed was Slytherin himself set into the wall. He could – somehow – smell the thing behind the wall, curled up behind the mouth, and called out to it in parseltongue, taunting it with its cowardice and failure to kill even a single muggleborn in the school above. It hissed angrily and the mouth of the statue opened, issuing forth a green-black serpent twice as long as the lorries that he had seen driving past Privet Drive that summer. He saw nothing of its size, though, nor its wicked fangs or its killing eyes. He saw only the monster that had hurt his friend – his only friend. The cold thing where his heart had been seemed to open like some kind of macabre flower and something came out.

Harry was never able to remember the next few minutes except in vague flashes. Images of claws and savage teeth biting into the basilisk's flesh. Venomous blood spraying into eyes that saw the serpent from dozens of angles. Water rising and thrusting itself down the snake's throat. Eyes and teeth and claws and poison and water woven together in a horrific symphony of destruction that left the basilisk a savaged corpse on the stone of the Chamber's floor and Harry himself exhausted and wounded beside it, his blood mingling with that of the monster that he slew.

When he woke again, Harry felt almost distanced from his blood-soaked body, as if he stood outside himself. He saw his body stand up and walk its way back through the bone-strewn cavern. He saw his hands twist into wicked claws and bite into the cold-smooth stone of the chute that lead down into the Chamber as he climbed his way up to the school proper. He seemed to float beside himself like a ghost as he climbed his way back to the showers on the third floor, cleaned the blood off and then returned to Gryffindor Tower, a walking corpse in all but name. He felt nothing. The frigid anger and all-consuming hate that he had felt for the monster that had petrified his friend was gone. All that was left was a void where it had been, a black immensity like the abyssal plain at the bottom of the ocean. For all that he had defeated the monster and prevented any more petrifications, it wouldn't help Hermione. All he could do was wait for her to wake. Having exacted his revenge, he felt… empty. Useless.

It was all that he could do to tear himself away from her bedside in the hospital wing to do his homework or go to class. When she finally woke, with help from a mandrake draught prepared by Professor Snape, he was anxiously waiting for her. He would forever deny it afterwards, but he shed tears of joy when her body relaxed from the unnatural stiffness of petrification and her eyes opened again. He could almost have said that he was perfectly happy, were it not for the cold, alien thing that still resided where his heart should be.

* * *

When Harry returned to the Dursleys that summer, he was not alone. After the last summer, he had asked Dumbledore if he could stay somewhere - anywhere - else, enduring the burning, stinging touch of the man's magic. All that it achieved was to make Dumbledore's customary eye-sparkle turn into something altogether more unpleasant, as if he was remembering something terrible, and a point-blank refusal to consider it. With no other options, after McGonagall ignored his requests as well, citing Dumbledore's ineffable wisdom, Harry went to Professor Snape, hoping that he, as the only one who had actually seen what the Dursleys had done (and even now the thought of that summer trapped in his room made the thing in his chest swirl in hatred), he might help.

It was a remote hope, but one that was fulfilled, albeit accompanied by a cavalcade of snarky comments and biting remarks. Snape - who Petunia seemed to recognise, for some reason - seemed to take great pleasure in putting the fear of God into the Dursleys, telling them that he had cast a charm on the house which would alert him to any abuse or mistreatment of Harry at their hands. He, in turn, would alert the Ministry of Magic, who he had made clear would be more than eager to creatively punish anyone who harmed their savior.

Luckily, it seemed to work, and Harry spent a relatively pleasant summer at 4 privet Drive, only having to endure chores and the spectacularly unoriginal insults of the younger Dursley, Dudley. He discovered that he was able, with a great deal of concentration, to change parts of his body, manifesting claws, a number of extra eyes (which was incredibly confusing), a distended jaw full of vicious teeth and, to his delight, a set of gills at one point. He discovered that it was easier to do when he was immersed in water - like when he managed to steal a short bath - and, more unfortunately, that it tended to work on its own when he was under stress or high emotion, especially emotions like anger.

Like he was now. Vernon's horrible dog-breeding sister, who Harry knew only as Marge, had come over for the weekend and the whole family was currently sitting at the table in the Dursley's dining room, nodding along with her as she casually insulted him and his family. Harry was gritting his teeth, holding back the cold thing inside that wanted nothing more than to come out and tear her limb from limb. He wanted to as well, and that scared him. He could imagine it clearly, how it would feel, for her skin and muscle to part beneath his claws, for her bones to snap. He could almost taste the scent of her blood in the air. He would not let it out, though, no matter how much he wanted to. Then he would be no better than the monster that killed his parents, no better than a beast. It was hard though. He had to excuse himself to go to the bathroom when he felt his teeth sharpening into vicious points and it took him a few minutes to get control of himself again. As he walked back towards the dining room, though, he heard Marge speaking again through the door.

"It's one of the basic rules of breeding." she said, between gulps of wine and stabbing her finger at the table. "You see it all the time with dogs. If there's something wrong with the bitch, there'll be something wrong with the pup-" At that moment, Harry lost the will to hold back entirely. She was comparing his mother, who had given her life for him, to a dog. How dare she!

He barely noticed that he was changing until he reached out a clawed, misshapen and elongated hand towards the door. The skin was mottled in shades of grey and black, with bony plates forming before his eyes. His vision split and now he saw door from six angles at once. As well as his ordinary vision, he could see the shapes of the Dursleys through the thin, plasterboard wall. He grew in height, his head now brushing the ceiling and his clothes straining at the seams. He felt his jaw and face lengthen to accommodate a full set of razored fangs. The pipes in the walls rattled and he could feel the water there. He knew that if he wanted, he could call it to him and set it on them, thrust it down their throats and into their lungs. The thing in his chest seemed to spread and take root, ensnaring his mind with the thought of taking vengeance upon Marge for what she had said. After all, she had insulted him and his kin. She deserved noth **ing but DEATH-**

No.

A moment before wrenching the door open and unleashing the monster on the Dursleys, Harry pulled himself and was horrified at what he was thinking and what he had become. He fled up the stairs to his room and slammed the door behind him. His throat felt choked, but no tears fell from his six lidless eyes. He drew digitigrade legs up to his chin and wrapped misshapen arms around them. Slowly, ever so slowly, his teeth retreated back into his gums. The strange, pale spectres of things through walls vanished as the eyes that saw them closed once more. Finally, hot tears began to fall, punctuated by quiet, body-wracking sobs. He fell asleep there, against the wall, staining his second-hand clothes with the salt of his tears. And he knew not whether he wept for what he had almost done, or for not doing it.

When Harry woke the next day, he made a decision, there in the darkness before the sun rose and shone in through his window. He decided that he would not return. That he would find somewhere else to go, anywhere but here. He did not know whether he did it for the sake of the Dursleys, that they might not die at his hands, or to save himself the guilt, but he decided. He pulled up the floorboard under which he stowed the few belongings that he had managed to smuggle up and pulled out the empty pillowcase that they were kept in. He crept down the stairs and went to the cupboard beneath them, where his school trunk had been stowed. With a moment of concentration, he shifted, just enough to break the lock on the door when he pulled it open. He felt the cold thing inside him rear up in anger, rebelling at the thought of leaving the Dursleys unpunished but he wrestled it back down. He pulled out his trunk, absently noting that it seemed so much easier to carry it like this, before dragging it to the front door, turning the key that had been left in the lock and leaving the house.

He took the Knight Bus to Diagon Alley, having learned of it from Snape the year before, as apparently Snape disliked Apparition and portkeys with a fiery passion. He managed to persuade the innkeeper at the Leaky Cauldron to let him stay in one of the rooms there and to keep quiet about his presence. The rest of the summer was probably the most enjoyable that Harry had ever had as, after talking to the goblins who managed his accounts, he discovered that the money in his trust vault was not, in fact, all he had for his school years at Hogwarts but was in fact refilled annually from the Potter family vault, which apparently had quite impressive reserves of money thanks to some wise investments by his parents. With his newfound financial security, Harry was more than happy to explore the shops in and around Diagon Alley, especially the various bookshops . He had learnt from the previous summer that knowledge, while not the same thing as power exactly, it certainly helped, and he was determined not to be weak again, never to be at the mercy of another, not the thing inside him, not his relatives and not even Voldemort, if he could help it.

And so it was, that two weeks into his stay at the Leaky Cauldron, Harry Potter ventured into the seedier side-street of Knockturn Alley under a glamour, tempted by both the promise of books and tomes with magic that he could use to improve himself and by the 'scent' of a watery, cold and comforting power. The buildings on either side of the alley were tall and seemed to lean out over the filthy cobbles below, blocking out the light of the sun. The other occupants of the alley seemed to scuttle furtively past like crabs at the bottom of the sea, clutching unidentifiable bundles to their chests underneath voluminous cloaks that permitted only the sight of a crooked nose here or a too-long, bony hand there. The shops were just as mysterious, with only a few having actual names attached, while the rest seemed to get by on people already knowing what they sold.

Harry followed the 'scent' of the familiar power to a small, wood-fronted building squashed between a large pawn shop called Borgin & Burkes and a much taller structure painted in lurid pinks and purples. Easing the door open and wincing at its loud _creeeeak_ , Harry saw that the shop was filled from floor to ceiling with books. Books towering like the trunks of dead trees, still reaching for the light, peeking out of shelves like mushrooms and even taking the place of floor tiles in some places. The air was filled with the smell of old paper and the faint corruption of mould. The scent of whatever had brought him here was strong, though, and directed Harry to one of the tallest shelves at the back. He pulled down the tomes of the pile with an almost manic energy, desperate to see what had drawn him.

He knew, when his fingers touched the strangely smooth leather of the thin tome, that this was what he was looking for. It seemed to just fit in his hands, despite the strange, almost sharp feeling of the cover and the way that just looking at it seemed to twist the mind, like looking at an optical illusion. He was just about to open it to have a look inside when a hand fell onto his shoulder. He whirled around to see who it was.

Behind him stood a tall, bald man, his craggy face deeply incised with scars and wrinkles in equal measure. He looked like an amateur sculptor had tried to sculpt the embodiment of decrepitude. His other hand lay on a twisted and gnarled cane and it was obvious the amount of weight that he was putting on it. "You want that one? I warn you, there's some ugly magics on it," he said, before breaking into a coughing fit. "I don't know why you'd want it anyway, no one's ever been able to work out what it says." Harry nodded silently, a bit intimidated by the man. "Well, if you're sure, that'll be seven galleons. And don't say I didn't warn you."

Harry counted out the coins from his purse before making a hasty retreat from the shop, clutching his prize to his chest. He quickly made his way back to his room at the Leaky Cauldron, dodging what he suspected was a hag along the way. He locked his door and flung himself down on the small bed and opened the book. For a moment, the first page seemed to be covered in strange, impossible symbols, square triangles and round squares torturing his eyesight before they seemed to resolve into a legible, if spidery, hand.

 _To my kin, I leave this book and the ways, secrets and histories of our kind within, it read._

 _I know that your life has been a lonely one and that you, like myself, have no parents to guide you. You too might one day learn the way by which I know of this, but for the moment know that you are heir to a legacy that originated in the days before man had even climbed down from the trees. Perhaps it even predates the very Earth_ itself, _but know this: you are Leviathan and of the bloodline of the seven Progenitors. You might embrace your heritage or flee it, but you cannot deny it. We both are of the Wicked Tribe, but what I have made and you will make of that is in our hands._

 _I will waste no words: we are, in many ways, monsters. But we are as much god as monster and as much man as god. Our road is a hard one, for we do not belong in this world, but if you tread it well and with resolve, you might yet fend off the madness of godhood and of beasthood and live to achieve that which I have seen you might._

 _I leave you the knowledge of my life, that you might learn from my mistakes._

 _\- Alden Malok_


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N:** Here's the next chapter of Leviathan and I'm sorry for the wait. In other news, I've got a few clarifications to make. First of all, what Harry is has nothing to do with the biblical Leviathan, apart from a shared association with water. These leviathans are much closer to Lovecraftian stuff, being the descendants of monstrous alien beings that are called gods for lack of a more applicable term. 'Leviathan' is applied as a singular and plural term at various points, like 'sheep'.

Also, there's going to be a bit in this chapter from Dumbledore's perspective and I'm going to be portraying him as I see him: as an arrogant, manipulative and powerful wizard who has, over the course of decades with everyone around him telling him that he is the very pinnacle of goodness and wisdom, come to partly believe his own legend. He knows that he is still fallible but cannot see a better way than his own. He is, to the misfortune of everyone around him, a man utterly convinced that what he is doing is the only way and for the Greater Good. He knows that he is doing horrible things to the few for the benefit of the many and has found that to be a price worth paying.

I'm not trying to bash. If I have failed in this, please tell me so.

Sorry about the long A/N and for my digression in the first scene with Harry.

Anyway, here's the disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or Leviathan: the Tempest. At all.

* * *

In his office, high in one of the towers of Hogwarts, Albus Dumbledore was pondering the state of the war with Voldemort and the Dark Lord's nemesis.

When Harry had arrived at Hogwarts in his first year, Albus had been surprised with how quiet and introverted he had been. He had known that the ten years with the Dursleys would not be easy ones for the boy but it was necessary. After all, which was better, an upbringing with too little love or no upbringing at all?

Something else that had surprised him was the boy's obsession with water, of all things. James and Lily had told him about Harry's love for it, of course, but he had spent _ten years_ being told that magic was not real. That should have been more than enough to make him pull away from the wild magic of the element. Instead, his affinity seemed to only have grown. In fact, his affinity for water might even surpass his own for transfiguration or Tom's for the Dark Arts.

Yes, Dumbledore mused to himself, sucking placidly on a sherbert lemon, for all that his elemental affinity might be the power that the Dark Lord knows not, it must be curtailed somehow, lest he make the same mistakes that both Tom and he himself had made during their youth. That sort of power in the hands of a hormonal teenager, driven by emotion and passing feelings untempered by the wisdom of years would spell disaster, as it had with Tom.

Dumbledore came the decision that yes, he would have to bind that affinity to a degree. Perhaps about three quarters of its power could be locked away, with the bindings beginning to degrade after Harry came of age. That way, if he was still alive Dumbledore could guide him in gaining control over his powers and if, as he feared, he would not survive the coming storm, Harry would be of an age where he could learn control himself.

Dumbledore suddenly felt very old, his years catching up with him as he thought of what might have to be done in order to win this war against the Dark. His fears that Tom had made those abominations against the natural order, Horcruxes, had been confirmed when he had investigated Harry's scar on that terrible October night in 1981. He had done his best to weave the magic of Lily's sacrifice around it to keep it in check but that kind of magic only ever lasted so long. Sooner or later it would break through the confinement and begin to influence Harry. He had done all he could to try and find some method of extracting the soul fragment from a Horcrux from a vessel without damaging it but all indications so far pointed to the destruction of the vessel being a vital component.

In that moment, Dumbledore felt every one of his 111 years, as he contemplated another bright soul being taken from the world before their time. But such things must happen, such sacrifices must be made.

For the Greater Good.

Alone in his tower, an old man tried to make himself believe his own words. There was no one to see the hot tears which soaked silently into his beard.

* * *

Harry sat in the centre of the ritual arrangement of water bowls and the symbols of the seven bloodlines of the Tribe and tried not to shudder in pleasure at the luxuriant feeling of the cold, alien magic brushing against his skin.

According to Alden's book, this was one of the simplest and weakest of the rituals of the Wicked Tribe, a kind of divination designed to identify which of the seven Progenitors the ritemaster was descended from.

According to the myths of his kind - which Alden had made abundantly clear were patchy and unreliable at best - at some point in the past, when there was no land and the Earth was covered in endless oceans, it was visited or inhabited by a being or thing known as Tiamat. It was not entirely clear whether Tiamat was a singular godlike entity or even just another word for the primordial ooze, but the tale wnt that it/she brought forth nine children to rule over the world. Again, it was not clear whether these were singular beings or lines of evolution but they were named.

The firstborn was called Nu or Nunet and was known as the Elder. It was a being of the primordial waters and of time and of space, as much a part of them as a god over them. It stretched forth its coils through all of time and space and gave birth to countless being which resided in the places in between spaces, as well as the formless creatures of the deep. After Nu was birthed the being known as Lahamu, a god whose myriad eyes were the sun, moon and stars and who could see into the present, past and future with equal ease. Nothing was hidden from Its perception and It set in motion the spin of the planets around Earth.

The third of the Progenitors to be birthed was the being known as Dagon. Dagon was a thing of infinite fecundity and fertility and gave birth to the myriad creatures of the seas, from seaweed to fishes to great creatures which no longer roam the oceans of the world. Next came the being known as Ziz, a creature of the skies which gave birth to the insects and flying things. Ziz stirred the skies to a fury with his wings, calling up storms which raged across the surface of the seas without end.

The fifth to be birthed was brought into the world to break the storms of Ziz and was known as Bahamut the Unchained. A being of incalculable size, Bahamut's back broke the waves and was the first land to come into existence. Now that the seas no longer covered all the world, Ziz's storms were calmed and spent their fury against Bahamut's unchanging flesh. Next came the twin children born to populate the land, Oceanus the Lord of Rivers and Rain-Bringer and Behemoth the Crawler. With Oceanus' waters, life came to the formerly barren lands of Bahamut and Behemoth birthed countless creatures to live there.

Finally came the last two, born at the same time, each battling the other even as they came into the world. They were Thalassa the Mighty and Sinner-Devouring Tannin, the first the strongest creature in existence and the second the first among predators.

Over time, these nine beings gave birth to all of the creatures of the world and were thus known as the Progenitors. They even gave birth to humankind and all but Ziz and Behemoth, seeing potential in these new creatures, blended their essence with them, creating emissaries: the Leviathan. The seven Strains of the Leviathan taught the primitive human tribes the ways of the world, how to build, how to work metal and how to weave their own, peculiar brand of magic. Under their guidance, the human tribes built great cities and temples to the Progenitors and both Leviathan and human prospered, with the Leviathan ruling as demigods.

In time, though, the humans became unsatisfied with their subservient state and rose up against the Progenitors and their priests, the Leviathan. However, they knew that they would never be able to defeat them directly and so they organised the greatest work of magic in history: a spell to complete the works of the progenitors, to make them into what they birthed. Bahamut _became_ the land, even as Lahamu became the sun and stars and Tiamat was sundered utterly, a fragment of her being living on in all life.

The Leviathan survived though, their mingled blood protecting them from the great magic. They interbred with humans in order to survive the aeons since. Some Leviathan have since attempted to revive the Progenitors but most have accepted their defeat and seek to await their chance to return to a position that, if not as prominent as their former one, is at least accepted.

All Leviathan, though, descended from the seven progenitors who saw fit to blend their essence with humans and each Strain manifested different abilities, as befitting of their legendary ancestor, although there was always some overlap. This rite would allow Harry to discover the potential within himself and thus begin to master it.

He breathed in and out slowly, calming his thoughts, before he began the chant that he had rehearsed over and over again, a series of forty-nine words in the ancient tongue of the First People, a language unlike any today. The chant had to be repeated seven times before he added a drop of his blood to each of the bowls of water. According to the book, the blood would crawl up onto the the symbol of his Strain which was half-submerged in the water while the others would simply remain as they were.

He reached the end of his chant and reached for the fishbone which he had begged from the kitchen of the Leaky Cauldron last night. He pricked his finger and allowed a drop to fall into the bowl with the (dragon's) fang of Tannin. The blood simply dispersed into the water. The same thing happened with the eye of Lahamu (represented by a clear quartz), the broken chain of Bahamut and the crab's claw of Thalassa. When the blood fell into the bowl containing the circlet of Oceanus (made from a tin can the night before), something happened.

Harry felt a rush of that strange, cold energy again washing over his skin and out, towards the bowl. The blood gathered in little pools around where the water touched the little tin crown and sunk into the metal. Where it did so, a golden hue washed over the tin, remaking it into a miniature circlet of gold.

Harry picked it up in and looked at it in wonder. The gold had a rippling, almost greenish tint to it, as though waves were worked into the metal. Although no bigger than the palm of his hand, the little band seemed to call out to him. He yanked up his sleeve and slipped the band onto his arm, where it fit perfectly.

Snapping out of his daze, Harry cleared up the spare bowls, washing the water down the en-suite toilet, as well as the pair of fish that he had bought, live, to sacrifice as the price for the ritual. He had been a little conflicted about killing them but eventually reasoned that they would have died anyway and at least this way they would serve a purpose before being eaten.

In truth, probably the hardest thing to do had been to prevent himself from eating them when he had partially transformed, as the ritual demanded, to kill them with his own claws. To his altered senses, they had smelled absolutely divine, the equal of Hogwarts' greatest feast. It had been thoroughly disturbing. He had managed it, though, by making use of one of the techniques described in Alden's journal for controlling his instincts: not to reject or deny them but to moderate them instead. He had made a note to order salmon the next morning.

After creeping downstairs (making sure not to wake any of the other residents of the Leaky Cauldron) and secreting the fish in the coldbox in the kitchen, Harry returned to his room and pulled out Alden's journal. He leafed through the yellowing pages until he reached the section on the Strains and found the entry on the Oceanids, the Strain descended from Oceanus.

 _The Oceanids are the Strain which I often find to be the most terrifying, for their powers, although often subtle, act upon the very minds of men. The Oceanids most often manifest powerful psychic abilities, as well as possessing minds which often surpass the human. Some that I have personally encountered have possessed the abilities to read and dominate the minds of others, enter and manipulate dreams (even to the point of 'dreaming' a goal and making it be so in the real world), make irresistible commands and layer their voices with suggestion and hypnosis. An Oceanid I once knew had a mind so sharp that he could perfectly calculate the path of projectiles in the air, to the point of being able to weave through spellfire as if it was not even there._

 _Other abilities commonly manifested by Oceanids are elemental powers, such as weather control and power over water, as well as physical might. Telekinesis is another common ability of the Oceanids. Relatively uncommon is the manifestation of physical weaponry and predatory traits, such as claws, sharp teeth and infallible senses, although it is certainly not exceedingly rare._

 _Oceanids must beware their tendency to use others without meaning to, as it can sometimes be difficult for them, once they have begun to use their abilities, to_ keep _from using them. Self-awareness and -discipline will serve them well. Another unfortunate side-effect of the ability to perceive the thought of others is that, if exposed to an environment where the Oceanid has little time on their own, they can become overwhelming._

 _It is my belief that a number of species of the Merpeople are in fact the result of ancient Leviathan interbreeding with humans, particularly the Oceanids, given the ease with which they can secure partners and the fact that many of the abilities of mermaids and sirens are remarkably similar to the Oceanids' (note the ability to manipulate minds, as expressed through enchanting voices)._

 _Being of the Lahamin Strain myself, I can sympathise with seeing more than one wishes, although - to my knowledge - the perceptions of the Oceanids often run deeper than a mere sense, as mine were, becoming an intrinsic part of their minds. I believe that this is why they have such difficulty controlling their powers, because they are an intrinsic part of their mental make-up._

As Harry finished the page, a yawn bubbled up in his throat. Looking at the clock, he realised that it was past midnight. He closed the book and slid it under the bed, before climbing on top of it himself and pulling the sheets over his still-clothed body.

* * *

The next day found Harry out exploring Diagon Alley again, as well as the various side-streets. It had turned out that as well as Knockturn Alley, there was also a Virtic Alley which was lined with hotels, cafes and portals to famous Wizarding English locations and a Horizont Alley, Wizarding London's residential section.

By mid-morning, Harry was beginning to feel rather hungry, and made his way over to Florean Fortescue's Ice Cream Parlour. He had just bought himself a large ice cream (chocolate and raspberry with chopped nuts) when he heard a shout from the direction of the Leaky Cauldron.

"Harry! There you are!"

He turned towards it. Hermione was charging towards him, dragging what he assumed were her parents behind her.

She seemed to be about to crash into haim and envelop him in a hug when she noticed his ice cream and pulled back. "That was a close one. Where _have_ you been all summer? I got a letter from Professor Dumbledore saying that he had gone to your relatives' house but you weren't there. He thought that you might have come to stay at my house for the summer-"

"If I could get a word in edgewise," interrupted Harry, smiling at Hermione's trademark babbling, "I'd tell you".

Chastened, Hermione looked down at her feet. "Sorry. I was just really worried, that's all."

"Never mind all that, give us a hug." Harry said, putting his ice cream down in a stand on the table and opening up his arms.

Hermione gladly surged forwards and wrapped her arms around him. They were only interrupted when her father spoke up.

"I don't need to be worried about this, do I?"

The two teens sprang apart, both of their faces flushing red.

"Dad!" yelled Hermione, embarrassed. Her parents chuckled.

"Stop teasing them, Dan," said Hermione's mother. "Anyway, why don't you two go and have a look around while your father and I relax here for a while. I'm sure Harry has plenty of stuff to show you. Just be careful, OK?"

Yes Mum" replied Hermione, before allowing Harry to drag her off back towards the Leaky Cauldron. He quickly showed her up the stairs and along the space-expanded corridor to his room.

"So. What do you want to show me?" asked Hermione.

Falling down to sit on the bed, Harry asked her if she would promise not to tell anyone.

"Why? It's not illegal is it?"

"No. It's just… well. You know how I told you last year about how I can sort of 'feel' magic?"

"Yes. I remember."

"Well, I think I've found out why." As he said this, Harry reached deep inside himself for the reserve of cold, slippery power which he now knew to be Ichor, the divine power and lifeblood of the Tribe. He found it and pulled it out, concentrating on transforming only his hand, which he held out in front of him.

As he coaxed the power out and into his arm, Hermione watched with wide eyes the flesh turn grey and smooth, even as his fingers lengthened and webbed, his nails turned to blackened claws and the outside of his forearm flattened and extended slightly in the beginnings of a fin. Harry felt the beginnings of the cruel instincts of the leviathan begin to emerge like fins above the surface of his mind.

"Wh-what is this? Did you try to become an animagus? That's illegal! You'll be sent to Azka-"

"I'm not an animagus," interrupted Harry "I'm something else." Pushing the Ichor back and letting his arm revert to human form, Harry leant down and pulled Alden's journal out from under the bed.

"A couple of days ago I started to feel something pulling me towards - and don't blow up at me - Knockturn Alley. It felt like the power that I use when I do _this,_ " He gestured to his arm "And I was curious, so I went to have a look. It turned out that it was this and when I had a look at it it explained everything. Have a look."

He handed the journal over to Hermione, who took it with a raised eyebrow and a look that said she thought he was out of his mind. She opened it and had a look at the first page, then looked up at Harry.

"It's in cuneiform, Harry. I don't read ancient Mesopotamian."

"Oh, sorry. I forgot, gotta translate it. Give it back for a second?"

He leafed through the little book until he came to the page with the translation spell. He mouthed the words first, then said them out loud. It was the same sibilant language as he had used when he cast the spell on the troll. Across from him, Hermione shivered a little at the sound.

"What language is that?"

"I think it's the language of my kind. Here, it explains it better than me," he said, handing the journal back to her.

As she read down the first page, Hermione's eyebrows seemed to be methodically climbing their way up her face. By the time she'd finished they were doing their best to disappear into her hair and she seemed to be trying to do an impression of a particularly surprised owl.

"I-If this is true, you're not even human? Is that what you're saying? How can that be true? How could you do magic if that was the case?"

"I don't know. Maybe I'm just weird. Wouldn't be the first time, after all."

Hermione snorted. Harry snickered at her doing something so incongruous with her normal aura of seriousness. Within seconds they were laughing together, all seriousness forgotten. Harry was glad they could still laugh together like this, even after what he had told her.

Happy in that his revelation had not jeopardised their friendship, the two friends spent the rest of the day exploring the Alley, dragging Hermione's parents around as many bookshops as could be found until, finally, they had to leave as the sun disappeared behind the close-packed shops.

* * *

The rest of the summer passed quickly, with Hermione coming to the Alley to visit him once or twice a week. They spent much of their time pouring over Alden's journal, trying to figure out what was hyperbole and metaphor and what wasn't (a magical genius the man may have been, a good writer he was not), interspersed with expeditions into the multitude of bookshops which populated the various alleys.

Unfortunately, the summer was not completely devoid of disagreements.

"Harry James Potter, do mean to tell me that you used magic during the holidays?! _Again!_ "

Harry shrank back a little from the irate Hermione, not having expected this reaction when he told her about the magic he had done to find out his lineage.

"Um… Yes? To be fair though, it wasn't wizarding magic-"

"And does that matter? It's against the _Law,_ Harry," you could hear the capitalisation "Just because it wasn't within the letter of the thing doesn't mean you should do it anyway!"

"Why not? The point of the Restriction on Underage Sorcery is to stop non-magical people from finding out about magic. I did it in my room in the Leaky Cauldron, with the door locked. And besides, we know from last year that the Trace only picks up on magic done around us, otherwise it wouldn't have registered Dobby's hover 's _tonnes_ of magic here, there's no way they could pick it up. Why do you think the purebloods are always so ahead with their spellwork? They just practice over the holidays in magic places."

Hermione looked like she wanted to disagree, but then what he said seemed to register.

"You mean that's why Malfoy's always so far ahead at the beginning of the year? But his father's on the Wizengamot! How can he just ignore the rules?! Ooh that…! Aaarrgh!"

Harry snickered quietly at the contortions she was making with her face. That turned out to be a mistake as she turned and glared at him, resolve shining in her eyes.

"Shut up Harry! Well if that… prat" - it sounded like she had only just restrained herself from using stronger language than 'prat' - "can cheat, so can I. Come on, let's see if we can find some other stuff about this special magic of yours."

"My my Hermione, breaking the rules are we?" teased Harry. He was rewarded with the vivid blush that sprang into existence, giving her face a hue faintly reminiscent of a ripe tomato.

"I'm only doing it because apparently everyone else is! And besides, don't you want to find out how this thing of yours works too?"

Holding in his giggles, Harry nodded and the two set out from the Cauldron to ransack the various bookshops of the Alleys for information on other kinds of magic.

An hour later found the pair back in Harry's room with no new books and a great deal of frustration.

"I can't believe that there's nothing!" exclaimed Hermione frustratedly "Nothing more than a couple of passing mentions of ritual magic. And even that can't have anything to do with your kind of magic since according to this" she waved the journal animatedly "your brand of magic can only be done by your kind."

"Well, all I can think of now is that there might be something at Hogwarts' library. Of course, there might be something down Knockt-"

"We're not going down there! Who knows what could happen? And besides, it's only a couple of weeks until we go back to Hogwarts anyway. Not too long and we can carry on looking at this in the meantime. Why don't we have another look at that section on the stages of transformation. You've only managed to get to the second so far - third if you include the thing with your aunt - and it says that there are seven."

Harry groaned. "Don't remind me, it's hard enough getting to that one. And we can't go further than the fifth without the lake to transform in."

Hermione smiled sweetly. "All the more reason to get cracking, then. Let's start with the hands and then work up the arms. Perhaps it'll be easier that way."

Harry had learned to fear that smile. He shuddered slightly before reaching inside for his Ichor and pulling it out again.

* * *

 **A/N:** Sorry to add another A/N at the end as well, but things had to be said. I don't know if I'm going to get the next chapter out as quickly as this one, as I'm going to have a lot of hassle with exam results and going from school to college. That said, I can give you a rough idea of what each chapter is going to cover. The next one (and _maybe_ the one after, depending on how long it gets) is going to cover 3rd year, the one after that the summer between 3rd and 4th, the next two (possibly 3 will be 4th year and the last will be an epilogue. The story has grown.

Also, I apologise if my dialogue isn't up to scratch. it's not my strong point.

Tata!

Dragon


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N:** Back again, and sorry for the wait. Things to beware of in this chapter are: rather esoteric views of magic, foreshadowing, Dumbles being himself (in my opinion) and Harry's first full transformation, along with a smidgen of ritual magic.

For future reference, Malok is pronounced mah-LOKE (the 'lok' rhyming with coke). Also, for the sake of having more space to work with, I'm imagining the Black Lake to be about three times the size of the shown in the films, and a great deal deeper, as the land underneath it collapsed sometime in the past to leave relatively shallow 'shelves' jutting from the shores over a far deeper lake. The merpeople's village and the stands for the Triwizard Tournament are set on one of these shelves.

I should point out that in the last scene Harry is not in his right mind. It's not always going to be like that when he goes full-transformation, it's his first time after all. He will be affected somewhat, just not to the same extent.

Oh, and here's a warning for what is technically canon character death (in the last section of teh chapter).

With no further ado:

 **Disclaimer:** I own no part of Harry potter or Leviathan: the I would have money. I do not. Therefore, I do not own Harry potter or Leviathan: the Tempest.

* * *

The sky was dreary and overcast, shrouded in grey cloud on the first of September when Harry took a taxi from the Leaky Cauldron to King's Cross Station to board the Hogwarts Express. He made his way through the barrier - it still gave him a very uncomfortable feeling when he passed through it - and, after meeting up with Hermione and saying goodbye to her parents, boarded the train.

It appeared that he was a little late, as most of the compartments were already full of students alternatively celebrating their reunion after the summer or bemoaning their return to school. Eventually, the pair found a compartment which was only occupied by a sleeping middle-aged man in ragged-looking robes and carrying a briefcase which proclaimed itself to belong to 'R. J. Lupin'.

To Harry's sense, the man felt a bit… off. As if there was something a little different in him. It didn't feel like his own power - it was nowhere near as cold and liquid as his Ichor - but it felt somehow sharp and he did feel a little chill, like a cool night. Also, where his own power felt like water, Lupin's felt like earth and forests. When Harry went near him, he felt the ghost of fur against his skin, a friendly, almost affectionate touch which made the thing inside want to come out. A little unnerved, the young wizard made a note to find out what might be causing that feeling. Perhaps it was just the way the man's magic was.

After making sure that the man was deep asleep and that they wouldn't disturb him, the pair stowed their trunks and got out their respective reading material, Harry choosing to continue reading the journal (which had turned out to have a kind of space-expanding enchantment on it so that it contained far more pages than it ought to) and Hermione perusing an old book on the theory of magic named _The Empowered Will._ Its author, one Jasmine Malok (the shared surname with the author of the journal being the reason it had originally come to their attention), claimed that wizarding magic was performed not, as most texts said, by using a 'magical core' within oneself, pointing to the fact that excessive use of magic placed strain on the body, as opposed to causing exhaustion, as one would expect if it was powered by an internal source. Instead, she proposed that 'low sorcery', as she called it, was performed by channelling an omnipresent energy from the world itself.

It was a little-known work, and one which was generally regarded with scorn by the greater wizarding community, mostly because the source of energy which she proposed was a collective human consciousness. The implication that muggles might be capable of tapping into this in some fashion was not well-received by pureblood supremacists and the book was, although not banned, relegated to the backs of second-hand bookstores like the one where they had found it.

Most interesting, though, was the author's passing mention of not one but _two_ other forms of magic, one which she called primordial sorcery and the other being theurgy or high sorcery. Although there was very little information on either - in fact, all there was was a mention of both forms being more involved and ritualistic than low sorcery, the latter drawing on the 'Dreaming Gods', archetypes within the collective consciousness and the former drawing on a different power source altogether - the mere mention that there _was_ another form of magic was better than anything else the pair had found.

Their whispered comparison of the rituals in Alden's journal with Jasmine's sparse references to theurgy and primordial sorcery were interrupted, though, by the train grinding to a halt. Harry looked out the window at the barren moorland around them.

"Why've we stopped? We're nowhere near Hogwarts."

"Maybe they needed to check on something?" replied Hermione, shrugging.

"What's going on?" came a sleepy voice from the corner of the room. Turning, Harry saw that Lupin had been woken by the jolt of the train and was now stretching his back.

"I think we've stopped, Mr. Lupin."

"Oh my, Harry Potter. A pleasure to meet you. And please, call me Remus-" The man stopped and the two young wizards could tell why. All of a sudden a chill had descended on the compartment and Harry could feel something outside in the corridor and coming closer. It felt cold, bitterly so, not the cold of the oceans but the cold of the winter, when he had shivered silently in his cupboard in the night when the central heating was off and the Dursleys were wrapped up in their blankets and duvets. It made him think of those frigid nights, all alone in the dark.

Harry shivered. Hermione hugged her arms around her middle. Lupin pulled his wand from his pocket.

Then the thing put a hand on the compartment door and slid it open.

All that could be seen other than the hand was a billowing cloak made of a material so black that it seemed to actually suck in the light, but the hand was enough. It was grey and rotten-looking with long, bony fingers and covered with wrinkles of peeling skin and ancient scabs. It was the hand of a dead thing, something that had had months to decay underwater. Frost formed on the windows and the thing in Harry's chest was raging to come out and devour the creature. He could feel his teeth sharpening to points as he held it down.

The hood underneath which there might have been a head slowly surveyed the cabin, before looking directly at Harry and floating slightly further into the cabin before Lupin stepped in front of it.

"Black isn't here. Go look somewhere else." His voice was firm and there was a certain quality to it that made it clear that he was serious. He raised his wand, pointing it at the creature's face before muttering something under his breath. A pale white light shone from the wand's tip and the creature seemed to jerk back slightly.

It drew in a rattling, diseased breath before turning wafting out of the cabin like a scrap of cloth in the breeze. In its wake, the air slowly returned to the temperature it had been before.

Lupin let his wand fall to his side with a quiet exhalation of breath. "It's gone. Are you to two OK?"

"W-what was that thing?" stammered Hermione. Harry was too concentrated on not allowing his body to transform, as it ached to, although the urge was slowly fading as the creature moved further away.

"That was a dementor, one of the guards of Azkaban Prison. They are creatures which feed on joy and which force you to re-experience your worst memories," replied Lupin, his face seeming very old, an impression only made more prominent by the deeply incised scars on his face and the streaks of grey in his brown hair. "They are here looking for Sirius Black. They must Have been told that he was on the train, although I can't fathom why."

Lupin went back over to his briefcase, opened it and reached his whole arm in, rummaging around in the expanded space inside.

"Who's Sirius Black, Mr. L-, Remus?" asked Hermione, still shivering a little from the effect of the dementor.

Lupin paused in his rummaging and looked back over his shoulder. "You don't know? It was in the papers all summer."

"Hermione lives in the muggle world," interjected Harry, "and I was really busy all holiday."

"You don't know either? But surely you've heard about what happened when James and Lily…"

Harry noticed that he used their first names, instead of just referring to them as 'his parents' as everyone else seemed to.

"You knew them?"

Lupin said nothing as he handed both of the young wizards half of a bar of chocolate.

"Eat it. It will help with the aftereffects of the dementor." He fell down heavily into the seat opposite Harry as if he was too tired to stand any longer. He brought his hands together in front of him and entwined his fingers.

"Yes, I knew them. I was best friends with your father through most of Hogwarts. So was Black. Of course, it turned out- Sorry, I'm getting ahead of myself. Your father, Sirius Black, Peter Pettigrew and I were fast friends through Hogwarts. We even had a group name, the Marauders. After we graduated, your father married your mother and they were happy, for a time. You see, that was at the height of You-Know-Who's power and he was going after everyone who opposed him, pureblood or not. Your parents were forced to go into hiding and their location was entrusted to Sirius, as we thought that he was trustworthy."

Lupin's face twisted for a moment and an ugly emotion could be seen there for a moment before he clenched his fingers together, the knuckles turning white, and seemed to regain control of himself.

"Unfortunately, that was not the case. It turned out that Sirius was a traitor. He betrayed your parents to Voldemort, Harry, and then he killed Pettigrew along with a dozen muggles. He was caught and sentenced to Azkaban for life. He escaped, though, this summer and is presumed to be looking for you, to 'finish the job'. Can you promise me, Harry, that you will be careful?"

Slightly overwhelmed, Harry nodded silently.

The rest of the train ride passed in silence.

* * *

After disembarking from the train and taking the Thestral-drawn carriages up to the castle, Harry was looking forward to finishing the Welcoming Feast quickly before making his way straight up to bed. Unfortunately, it was not to be, as Dumbledore apparently had other plans.

"As another year of school dawns upon us," declared the old wizard from his place at the Head Table "So too do we welcome in new things and people to our lives, such as the new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, Remus Lupin." Lupin stood up and bowed, to scattered applause from the Ravenclaw, Hufflepuff and Gryffindor tables.

"Unfortunately, we must also say goodbye to others, as we must to our dear Care Of Magical Creatures Professor Silvanus Kettleburn. Let's give him a last round of applause, shall we?"

The students dutifully clapped.

"Luckily for those of you who wish to continue or begin your studies into the fascinating variety of creatures that populate our magical world, there is a new teacher as well, in the form of our very own Rubeus Hagrid, who shall be teaching Care Of Magical Creatures for the foreseeable future." Dumbledore paused for the ruckus of mingled clapping, chatter, exclamations of surprise and outrage to subside.

"Now, on to less pleasant matters. As many of you have no doubt heard, the notorious criminal Sirius Black has recently escaped from Azkaban Prison and is believed to be likely to target Hogwarts. In order to prevent any harm from coming to the students here a number of the guards of Azkaban, dementors, have been stationed to protect the boundaries of the school."

Again there was an outbreak of noise among the students, this time more worried and frightened in tone. Dumbledore looked down at the children beneath over the top of his pince-nez. He held up a hand for quiet.

"I will warn you of this only once: do not attempt to make your way past them, either into or out of the grounds, without the accompaniment of a professor or an Auror of the Ministry. It is not in the nature of a dementor to pay heed to excuses or pleas for mercy. Attempting to break this rule will, if you are caught by professors, result in suspension; a penalty infinitely more lenient that the one the dementors will levy.

"Now that that is said, all that remains is to remind those among us who have the most _frightful_ case of forgetfulness that the Forbidden Forest does, in fact, live up to its name and that all products of Zonko's Joke Shop are now not allowed in the castle. Anyone who desires to know the full list of prohibited objects in invited to consult the list which hangs on the door of - and stretches across the floor opposite - Mr. Filch's office.

"Oh, and one last thing before we all retire to our delightfully soft, warm and comfortable beds. Could Mr. Potter please meet me in my office before he heads up to bed. Thank you. Off you pop now." Dumbledore waved his hands towards the now-open doors at the sides of the hall.

"What do you think he wants to talk to you about?" asked Hermione, leaning over to whisper to Harry over the clamour in the hall as the students filed out.

"Dunno. Maybe he wants to talk about my staying in the Alley over the summer?"

"Well, I'll meet you back in the common room, then?"

"Sure."

And with that, Harry split off from the rest of the student body and began to make his way up along the winding and sometimes Escher-esque passages and corridors of Hogwarts towards the Headmaster's office.

When he reached the stone gargoyle that guarded the way to the office hopped aside to allow the young wizard through. He made his way up the short flight of stone stairs and knocked on the heavy oak door at the top. "Come in." sounded the headmaster's voice, slightly muted by the thick wood. Harry took a hold of the iron handle, turned it and pushed the door open.

From behind him came a whispered incantation "Stupefy" and a flash of red light. Harry whirled on his heel, hand reaching for the pocket where his wand was stored. He only caught a flash of long white hair before the spell caught him in the shoulder and he collapsed to the floor.

* * *

Albus Dumbledore looked down at Harry Potter, crumpled on the floor after his stunning spell. He regretted tricking the boy and he regretted what he knew he had to do even more but took solace in the fact that it was for the Greater Good. Harry would have to sacrifice his power for the time being if he was not to be blinded by it. After all, if he kept that sort of power, what would make him realise that love and trust were the power that the Dark Lord knew not? Harry would become unable to see beyond the obvious, deceptive solution, as he, Albus Dumbledore had been unable to see past his own power in his youth. Yes, this was for the best.

Reassured in his own righteousness, the headmaster cast a swift Disillusionment Charm on himself and Harry before flicking his wand to levitate the boy behind him as he made his way through the halls of Hogwarts, down into the dungeons and towards Hogwart's ritual room, deep in the bowels of the castle.

After another fifteen minutes (and a pair of wrong turnings down space-warped corridors), Dumbledore reached his goal, a set of nondescript doors that looked for all the world like the ones which lead to any number of abandoned classrooms throughout the castle. Another minute or so saw the wards and glamours that he had placed on the door after he had stripped the Rituals class from the syllabus taken down, revealing their true selves to be a twin pair of obsidian slabs bound with cold iron to contain any residual magic. The aged wizard pressed his palms to the cold, magic-repelling substance and heaved the doors open, revealing the basketball court-sized room within, obsidian walls and floor inlaid with the same dark iron as the door.

He used his wand to direct Harry to the centre of the intricate circle of dragon's blood and phoenix ash that he had painstakingly laid out in the centre of the room earlier that day. With the extinction of the bennu-bird, a relative of the phoenix whose blood the ancient Egyptians had used in a similar ritual to grant power over fire and light, the ashes of a phoenix would have to do. The rite that he was using to bind Harry's elemental affinity was a variant of that ritual, called the Invocation of the Divine Flame, which Dumbledore had designed himself. He spared himself a self-satisfied smile at the ritual he had created, a binding which would not break except under the weight of a Dreaming God's direct power or on Harry's thirty-third birthday.

Shaking away the moment of self-admiration, the headmaster sobered himself with the recollection of the pain that this masterpiece would inflict on the poor boy lying on the cold floor. He steeled his resolve and began the chant, the first part of the ritual.

The sharp, guttural sounds fell from his lips like sparks and tongues of flame. The grey-red blood on the floor began to glow a dull red like banked embers. The walls were illuminated by their warm glow and the room began to warm.

Then things started to go wrong.

The air lost its warmth and began to cool further. Albus' breath billowed from his lips in a white mist even as he redoubled his chanting. The light of the ritual circle and marks guttered and died beneath the weight of the cold, fading to a few dying embers in the lines nearest him. The pressure of the deeps weighed down upon him and he knew that were he any weaker a wizard, he would have been drowning on the water that would have appeared his lungs

The headmaster had been expecting this, though, as he knew that as strong an affinity as Harry's would not go down without a fight. He called upon the Elder Wand and felt its power amplify his own. His chant increased in volume as he poured his power into the words and the ritual, literal sparks flying from his lips. Light kindled again in the blood on the floor, burning red and orange against the cold black of obsidian. Harry's mouth parted in a silent scream. The aged wizard had expected this and his heart went out to the young wizard for his torment. He still kept chanting, though knowing that the sooner he finished the sooner he could wipe the boy's memory of his pain.

He had not expected Harry to begin his own chant, though. The two liturgies clashed like waves upon a cliff, words of fiery purity falling like rain upon the primordial waters evoked by the sounds issuing from the boy's lips, sounds that were as much the wash of the sea, the crash of waves and the groaning of vast creatures in the deeps as they were words. They sounded utterly wrong, coming from the lips of a child, especially one so petite. Dumbledore could see Harry's mouth working, white teeth flashing against red flesh, but the sounds were mismatched to the movements, as if the boy had forgotten how to speak with a real mouth and the sounds were simply vomiting themselves into existence by his will, rather than any biological means. He began to sit up and then levered himself to standing, swaying drunkenly and unsteady on his feet.

Dumbledore felt the delicate lattice of magic constructed by the ritual begin to falter. Gritting his teeth, the headmaster redoubled his efforts, pouring as much energy as he possibly could into the ritual, even as he felt the strain of channelling such power begin to light a flame in his chest and singe his hair. The invoked fire still burnt within the lines of ash-mingled blood, but it was fading, losing to the oppressive, crushing weight of the cold power emanating from the child on the floor

" _How is this happening?"_ thought Dumbledore. _He's a child. There's no way that he could possibly resist to this extent. Lily must have done something, placed a protection on him, beyond the blood wards._

Then Harry opened his eyes. They were an iridescent, impossible green, the colour of seaweed and the wings of hummingbirds. The pupils were horizontal slits of blackness, as dark as the void between stars.

And then a second pair opened in the boy's forehead, and a third on his rapidly-greying cheeks. As the inhuman words were spat from the young wizard's lips, the headmaster could see sharpened, shark-like teeth flashing in the newly-lipless mouth. The last of the light in the ritual faded. The shadows in the room lengthened and reached out towards the elder wizard. The black glass of the floor cracked in several places under some immeasurable weight. Dumbledore felt something shift within the power flowing through him, a vast and terrible regard falling upon him.

Realising that continuing the ritual would be suicide, Dumbledore aborted his futile chant mid-sentence and mentally activated the spells worked into the ritual room. They were ancient magics from the time of the founders; intended to siphon all power from the room and shunt it to the leys beneath the castle, there to disperse into the ether. There was a moment of struggle, as if the magic protecting Harry almost resisted, and then all went quiet, save for the muffled _thump_ as the younger wizard slumped to the floor like a puppet with its strings cut. The sense of being watched and judged vanished and the headmaster breathed a sigh of relief at having evaded the retribution of the Dreaming God whose power he had 'borrowed'.

Dumbledore breathed heavily, sinking to his knees in exhaustion. The theurgic ritual he had personally crafted for this specific situation had failed. Utterly. He could not fathom what kind of creature Lily must have invoked to have it defend Harry so powerfully, even after all these years. He reflected that this was exactly the reason he had stripped the Rituals and Theurgy class from the seventh-year curriculum and done his best to see it condemned in law. It drew on things better left alone, except by those who knew exactly what they were doing. After all, it wasn't as if anyone had been taking advantage of it properly, what with all the superstitious nonsense about 'appeasing the gods' that they always went through. As if a couple of dead chickens would placate a god of fire. Ridiculous.

Slowly gathering himself, the headmaster got to his feet and walked over to Harry, Stunning him again, just to be sure, before obliviating the boy of all memory of the night, making him think instead that he had fallen through one of the fake stairs on the way up to the headmaster's office and that Dumbledore had brought him to the hospital wing after discovering him with a broken leg when he had failed to appear.

To complete the illusion, the aged wizard conjured a stone block and caused it to fall onto Harry's leg - not using a bone-breaker hex as such a spell would be easily identified by the nurse.

Finally, he conjured a splint and levitated Harry out of the ritual room, placing a quick glamour over the door before making his way up to the hospital wing, injured student in tow.

* * *

Later that night Harry was lying awake in a bed in the hospital wing, gazing out over the dark lake at the stars peeking between the ragged remains of the clouds which had earlier shrouded the sky and trying to ignore the uncomfortable burn throughout his body.

The nurse had healed his leg within moments but insisted on keeping him abed until the morning, stating that there was a chance that the magic wouldn't take and that it would re-break, especially if he was to put pressure on it. Apparently, he had fallen through one of the trick stairs on his way up to the headmaster's office and broken a leg from the fall, although he remembered nothing of the sort. In fact, the young wizard's memory was a blank from the moment that he had left Hermione in the Great Hall.

He had been unable to get to sleep, as his whole body had been plagued with a constant, bone-deep ache, a little like the feeling he got while he was transforming. That only ever lasted a few seconds, though. This had been troubling him ever since he woke up in the care of Madam Pomfrey, although when he mentioned it she could find no reason for it.

Which left him in his current situation, staring out at the stars over the lake and trying to ignore the feeling that his bones wanted to turn themselves inside out.

The stars, at least, drew his eye and allowed him something to focus on. Although the pain never faded, it seemed that he became somehow detached from it. It became something other than pain, a sensation not pleasure but not uncomfortable either. With a strange sort of clarity, Harry watched the stars wheel outside the window, their slow dance seeming laden with meaning.

As time wore on, more and more of the points of light seemed to fall into place, new patterns and constellations emerging from the chaotic points of light, each realisation sending a wave of not-pain through his body, a ripple of flesh and bone bringing with it a spasm of muscles. It began happening more and more often, the intervals between the spasms shortening from a half hour to ten minutes to minutes to only seconds between them.

It was a scant few minutes before midnight that there was no time left between the spasms and Harry's skin began to grey in earnest. A combination of desire not to let the drowsing nurse see his change (for she would surely report it to Dumbledore or, worse, the Ministry and he had seen the laws that oppressed werewolves and the various non-human races) and a desperate, burning desire for water led him to throw off the covers and make his way towards the window as best he could with both legs mutating and warping outside of his control and his spine slowly lengthening. By the time he reached it, the hospital shift that he was wearing was uncomfortably tight on his shoulders, despite it being loose only seconds before.

He pressed a webbed hand flat against the glass and watched it shatter under what felt like only a touch. Behind him, he heard the sleepy yelp of the waking nurse at the shattering of the glass as he fell through the window and down, down, down into the black water beneath.

The cold of the water was a shock to the system, but it only lasted a moment before it was superseded by the way that his body exploded outwards in unchecked growth upon touching it, accompanied by an excruciating burst of pain as his bones broke and reformed. His body expanded explosively, growing in girth but especially in length, becoming long and serpentine, tearing the hospital gown to shreds in the process. His head twisted into a dragonesque shape and his hair lengthened and thickened into seaweed-like tendrils that formed a mane, streaming from the back of his cranium. Two extra pairs of eyes opened on the sides of his new-formed face, leading down the long muzzle lin a line. His jaw stretched until it was longer than the height of a grown man and filled with vicious, shark-like teeth. His arms and legs flattened into great flippers, the forward pair longer than the one further back. The tip of his tail flattened into an eel-like paddle, the better to swim with. By the time the pain faded and the transformation was finished, nothing was left of Harry's human form, only the sleek, serpentine shape of an aquatic predator.

There was a moment of panic, when the young wizard flailed around wildly, unable to understand how to move his body before newfound instincts kicked in and showed him how to wind himself through the water, how to make use of his powerful tail to provide momentum and his flippers to steer. Within a few seconds, Harry-the-leviathan was exultant, glutted on his own physical power. He felt like the king of the world, the strongest thing alive, the apex predator.

He thrashed his tail powerfully and rose to the surface, rearing his head out of the water and letting out a piercing, rapturous shriek, underlaid with sub-harmonics which brought uncomfortable dreams of writhing things and endless, dark waters.

He dived back down into the depths of the lake, seeing the fish, eels and stranger creatures through the gloom as clearly as if it were day. Hunger struck the transformed wizard with the force of a hammer blow and he felt it coil in his stomach like a serpent. The creatures of the lake no were no longer divided between fish, grindylow, merman, squid. They were food, waiting to be consumed and those who were not would have only his munificence to thank.

Winding silently through the water, Harry-the-predator caught the scent of the giant squid wafting through the murk and latched onto it, instinct keeping the current flowing towards him and away from the squid itself. After all, what better way to make sure that he was unchallenged in his domain than to devour the most obviously powerful opponent?

With slow, powerful sweeps of his body, the transformed wizard made his way below the squid, which was patrolling the surface waters, almost certainly searching for the creature that had made a challenge to its dominion with its cry. Ironically, so concentrated was the squid upon trying to find Harry that it missed him approaching from below and only took notice when the great serpentine creature sunk its serrated teeth into its mantle and blue-green blood gushed out into the waters of the lake.

As the squid shrieked in pain and wrapped its thick tentacles around Harry's neck, trying desperately to dislodge his vicious fangs, all that he could feel was the utterly _divine_ taste of its rubbery flesh and copper-laced blood. It was better than the finest meals cooked by the Hogwarts house-elves, better than a glass of water after two days locked in the cupboard and eating spiders to stave off hunger. It was orgasmic - and Harry's mind vanished in that moment. He ripped and tore at the squid, wrapping his serpentine body around it and bearing down into the depths, even as the suckers of its tentacles made stinging welts upon his smooth, grey skin. When he tore off a chunk of meat and the squid tried to flee, a momentary exertion of his Ichor stirred the lake into a maelstrom which beat the squid back towards his waiting jaws.

Finally, the squid seemed to accept that the only way to survive this would be to defeat him and rode the current towards the waiting serpent, flailing its tentacles and grabbing at his flippers and head, trying to take control of the battle. Its hard beak bit and snapped at his muzzle, angering the already-frenzied serpent. Lashing out instinctively with his power, Harry thrust a cold psychic sword into the mind of the beast, cleaving through the feeble shields erected around its consciousness by its single-minded will to survive. Harry bit and tore at the squid's consciousness even as he ripped at its body, tearing primitive, dim memories of days and weeks spent underwater from their moorings and casting them adrift in the ocean of its mind. He shredded the creature's motor control and then left its mind.

Harry settled down, twined around the still-living form of his foe as they drifted slowly down into the lightless depths of the lake, to eat; confident in his new dominion.


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N:** Back again. Sorry it took so long. Life has a way of running away with us, I think.

Now, shoutouts. I would normally have put this in a reply, but as the people asking the questions was a guest, I have to put it here.

To the first guest who reviewed on 04/09/16, thank you very much for your sentiments. For my sources for Leviathans, look up Leviathan: the Tempest. There's a TVTropes page and info on the first edition on RPGnet wiki. And there is going to be that pairing, but not in great detail and only in little bits before the epilogue.

To the second guest, hence 'technical' character death and thank you. I've tried to get it out as quickly as I could.

 **Disclaimer:** I do not own Harry Potter or Leviathan: the Tempest. Life is both cruel and wonderful. Quadratic equations are complicated. These are truths.

* * *

When Harry awoke, he was not sure at first whether or not he had done so. He wondered if perhaps he was still dreaming, as surely it had to have been one. After all, you don't get kidnapped by your headmaster, used in a ritual whose magic grates on your skin like broken glass. You especially didn't have that same headmaster break your leg deliberately and then take you to the infirmary, only to tell the nurse that you had fallen off of a stair. And you most certainly don't fall from a 5th story window and down a cliff into a lake, transform into a sea-serpent-come-water-dragon and devour a giant squid alive.

That pleasant illusion of humanity shattered swiftly under the sudden realisation of reality, that the cold water against his grey, leathery skin was too physical, too _there_ to be a dream. The shreds of rubbery flesh that he could feel trailing from his jaws were all too real. When he opened his eyes, the darkness of the water lasted but a second before senses that he wasn't sure he could name showed him the rocky, uneven surface of the lake bottom upon which he rested.

Gigantic sea anemones as tall as a man reached out lazy arms towards the faint glimmers of light filtering down from the surface, lying in wait, he thought, for some passing fish to come within reach of their colorless pseudopodia. Long, sinuous eel-like creatures wound about the stones which littered the floor, searching for morsels of food within the cracks and crevices. Further off, a small school of what looked like fish with long, spindly legs - Harry remembered that they were called plimpies - bounded their way across the lakebed, looking for all the world as if they were on the moon.

None of the creatures had disturbed him and none came near him nor the hollowed-out carcass of the giant squid that he had fallen asleep wound around. Little remained of it save the outer mantle.

For a moment, Harry pitied the creature and felt almost sorry for it, before the memory of how exquisite its taste had been drove the thought from his mind, along with the hunger that once again roiled in his stomach despite his enormous meal. The corpse now looked unappetising though, its flesh torn into strands and mingling with the silty mud that drifted on the currents of the lake.

The thought of food brought to mind the delicious - if rich - breakfasts that were served daily in the Great Hall above, bringing Harry's mind back to the school above, as well as Hermione - who he had no doubt would be worried sick over him - and the Headmaster, who he now knew beyond a shadow of doubt had ulterior motives to do with him. It was merely luck that his transformation had erased the mental block that Dumbledore had placed with his obliviation - he recalled Alden mentioning something about a leviathan's first full transformation ('apotheosis', the scholar had called it) often healing or erasing injuries and maladies from beforehand. He was only luck that the obliviation had not taken full hold.

His resentment for Dumbledore now burning like an ember in his chest, Harry unwound himself from the squid and began to make his way upwards, heading for the light.

He passed a number of odd creatures on his way up but none stranger than the sight that awaited him as he rose above a great shelf of rock protruding from the sheer side of the lake. There, on the edge of the abyss that plunged into the darkness below, was a group of perhaps three dozen merpeople, all with their heads downturned and holding different items - fish and small, crude stone idols were common - in their hands, as if offering them up. In front of the group was a merman with empty hands, his pale, bone-white skin and scales contrasting with the dull grey-green of the rest. At the sight of Harry-the-leviathan rising from the deep, the pale merman - some kind of priest, Harry realised - raised his arms and cried out to him, an oddly melodic note in his voice.

"O great one, scion of the line of our creator, we beg your magnanimousness in allowing us to remain here and to serve you as your most humble disciples. Please, we beg that you allow us to reside within your domain and to be your chosen people, O great one, of the line of the Shattered Gods. We ask you to accept our offerings as a sign of our continued faith in your line."

Harry realised that the pale merman was, if merpeople aged anything like humans, a teenager at best. He was shaking and, although he did not know how, Harry could sense that the young merman, as well as the rest of the merpeople, were terrified. Of him.

All of a sudden, Harry felt uncomfortably like his bullying cousin. He had spent the last night killing and devouring the Giant Squid, a creature which, as far as anyone could remember, had been nothing but helpful to the students of Hogwarts. Not human, thankfully (and that thought disturbed Harry, as he did not know whether or not he would have gone after a human the night before, given the chance), but a creature who had done no harm beyond what it needed to to survive. Something cold and unpleasant twisted deep in Harry's stomach at the sight of the petrified merpeople.

Even though a large part of him rebelled at the thought - the part that had always kind of liked the way that everyone in the Wizarding World looked up to him - The wizard-turned-leviathan bowed his own head to the merpeople-tribe. Instinctively knowing how, he reached out with a gentle tendril of thought to the pale priest. He could feel the young merman's fear, but also a degree of shock at his actions. Gently entering his mind, Harry sent an impression of calm and mean-no-harm, along with the words "Do not bow to me. I do not want to frighten you."

The merman jerked where he floated in the water and Harry could feel the storm of panicked half-thoughts through the mental link he had created. Had he done something wrong? What did the Great one mean? Would he simply destroy them? What was going on?

Linked to those thoughts were countless memories of the young merman's elders telling him of their creator, the creature known as Cseag. Telling him of how they were created to be the ancient leviathan's servants, slaves and cult in one. Telling him of how, should any of Cseag's race come to the Black Lake, it was the duty of his family and, thus, his duty to see that the community in the Black Lake endured, no matter the price. Telling him of the horrors and abuses that had been visited upon them by their creator and what they could expect should another Leviathan come to the Black Lake.

Sick to his stomach at some of the things that the young merman had been told, Harry did his best to project an air of calm and benevolence through the link.

"I mean no harm to you, nor do I want you to be my slaves," he projected, "I'm going to go back up to the castle. Please, just carry on however you did before."

So saying, he severed the psychic link and thrashed his body from side-to-side, forcing himself upwards in the water and away from the mer-tribe who were looking after him in confusion and tentative relief.

* * *

 **A/N:** I apologise for the fact that the chapter is so short this time, but I've had a lot going on and so I thought I'd bring out teh next chapter now rataher than waiting another couple of weeks. I have by no means abandoned this story and fully intend to continue it.


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N:** I'm back! I'm sorry for the long wait. I hope you think it's worth it. Also, I would like to thank the reviewer Darthas for inspiring me to finally finish this thing.

 **Disclaimer:** I own neither Harry Potter nor Leviathan: the Tempest.

* * *

Upon reaching the surface and seeing the pale light of the Scottish sun beginning to peek over the mountains in the distance, Harry concentrated on changing back, as he had practiced countless times with Hermione before. To his great relief, he immediately felt the profoundly strange sensation of compacting back into himself, the corded muscle and grey skin folding themselves neatly back into a bud of power in his chest, ready to bloom again. His relief was short-lived, however, as he realised that his clothes had been torn to shreds the night before and that he was standing waist-deep in the Black Lake barefoot and naked as the day he was born.

With a yelp, Harry jumped backwards into the water, then yelped again as a sharp stone caught in the flesh of his foot. He cast about for a place where he might be able to find some clothes. After a moment or two of panicked searching, he caught sight of a small shed a few hundred metres down the shore. Perhaps it was where the boats that they brought the first-years over the lake on?

Swimming over and reaching the shed, Harry climbed out of the water (making _very_ sure to keep the little building between himself and the castle) and tried the door. It was locked, although looking through the gap between the doors the young wizard could see that the small bolt which kept it so looked quite old and rusted.

Sparing a moment to snort at the negligence of wizards and not putting preservation charms on things, Harry shoved at the door. It rattled, but didn't budge. Huffing, he closed his eyes and concentrated on the little bud of power inside him and tried to transform a little, to the 'First Depth' as Alden called it.

He was taken by surprise when the power rushed out in a flood, far more easily than usual, and he had to concentrate not on changing, but on _stopping_ it before he transformed completely. It took a few seconds for him to stabilise himself in the Third Depth, the form he had changed into at the Dursley's earlier that summer. He decided not to tempt fate again before he got a hold of some clothes and slipped the blackened claws of his hands into the gap between the door and the doorframe before heaving.

The old metal of the hinges and bolt resisted for a moment before shearing and snapping with a _crack_. Harry stumbled back a few steps, getting his balance with the unexpected weight of the door and resting it against the shed. He looked into the little wooden building.

The inside of the shed, which was several dozen times the size of the outside, was full of boats of various sizes and descriptions from tiny rowboats to what looked like a small yacht, along with the equipment for servicing them. The shed was more like an indoor dry-dock than anything else and Harry wondered why it was there. He had never heard of any kind of boating done at Hogwarts, apart from the first years of course.

Getting his mind back on track, Harry caught sight of a set of old overall-like clothes hanging on the wall. He concentrated for a moment again and was astounded with the ease with which he transformed back to human form. A cold breeze made him shiver and he quickly walked over to the overalls, thankful for the smooth floor of the shed. Pulling them down and shrugging them on, Harry felt far better with some clothes on, even if he was swimming in them due to the size. Pulling on the pair of solid leather boots that the overalls had hidden, the young wizard put the door back into the frame so that it looked stable again and made his way back up towards the castle along the path from the landing stage a little way along from the boat shed.

The walk took only a few minutes, but by the time that Harry reached the small door that he remembered going through in his first year, he was freezing beneath the thin fabric of the overalls. Covering they may be, but warm they were not. The dampness from the lake had not helped either.

Saying a quiet thanks to whatever gods were out there that breakfast had not been served yet, Harry quickly followed the well-travelled route up to Gryffindor Tower, before being stymied by the portrait of the Fat Lady. A quick conversation and a number of excuses about being in the hospital wing the night before and not having the password persuaded her though and she let him pass, although not without an admonishment that he should be more careful.

Another prayer of thanks for the laziness of Gryffindors later, Harry crossed the abandoned common room, quietly climbed the stairs to his dormitory and edged the door open.

Peeking through the gap, he thanked whatever god was watching over him, as the four boys with whom he shared a dorm were still fast asleep. Sneaking across the room as quietly as he could, the young wizard crept across the room and retrieved a set of clothes from his trunk, along with his schoolbag. He made his way to the bathroom and changed quickly. He left the overalls in the bin where all dirty clothes were to be put for the house-elves to clean before making his way down to the Great Hall for breakfast.

* * *

Over the days following his transformation in the Black Lake, Harry withdrew from the life of Hogwarts. After fending off the inquisitions of Madam Pomfrey with a tale about accidental magic saving him from the Lake, only to leave him on the shore exhausted, he spent another night in the Hospital Wing, so that she could ascertain that he had contracted no disease or suffered a chill from sleeping outside.

While he was there, Hermione had come to visit him and asked him about what had happened on the night of the welcoming feast. He put her off and deflected her inquiries with noncommittal answers and vague responses, fearing that at this latest transformation even she would abandon him. After all, he couldn't even pretend that he was human anymore.

In the hours following his return from the Lake, Harry had begun to feel a… _constriction_. As if his skin was too small. Where before it had only been great anger or emotion which made his teeth want to turn to needles, now he felt that every time someone irritated him even a little. Draco Malfoy had tried to make fun of him at breakfast, saying that the 'precious Golden Boy' couldn't even go a day without something happening. Perhaps he'd inherited that from his mudblood mother? After all, she'd managed to get herself killed by the Dark Lord himself.

The mocking tone that the platinum-blonde had said that in, as if having Voldemort kill her was the greatest honour he could imagine Lily Potter earning, was enough to make Harry's fingertips ache with claws and his cheeks itch with the wanting to open his other eyes and… what? He wanted to do something, something instinctual like breathing and sleeping, but something nameless to humans. He wanted to _rip-tear-dominate-crush-consume_ the boy. The closest human emotion that Harry could think to what he felt was hate and it was all he could do to clench his fists and let black, hardened nails bite into his palms.

He'd looked in Alden's journal - bespelled to look like the _Standard Book of Spells, Grade 3_ , just in case - and the old Leviathan described what Harry had gone through as the Metamorphosis, the last of the great transitions which their kind were guaranteed to go through. It was the change that brought entry into the full extent of a Leviathan's power, a coming-of-age. It was the change that made a Leviathan entirely responsible for what they would become.

Alden warned that he had seen more than one young Leviathan go mad with newfound power and become a monster with the might of a god, seeing all others as ants beneath their feet or, if they were lucky, worshippers deserving of the slightest notice. It was a madness not peculiar to Leviathans, the spidery handwriting mused, but one to which they were prone. Harry vowed that he would not become like those old, mad god-monsters.

So he did he best to get by, going to the classes, eating in the Great Hall and spending his free time in either the library searching for information, on theurgy or the 'primordial sorcery' mentioned in _The Empowered Will_ or pouring over Alden's journal in the Gryffindor common room. Neither expanded a great deal on the magic, nor provided references, with each being unhelpful in their own ways. _The Empowered Will_ claimed that theurgy was only taught directly from a student to a teacher, for fear of overeager or malicious practitioners performing rituals they they were not ready for or worthy of. A little digging in the Wizarding Law section of the library revealed that not only was this tradition, there was actually a law, passed in 1957, that prohibited rituals from being inscribed or recorded.

Meanwhile, Alden claimed that in order for primordial sorcery to work, a Leviathan had to create the rituals himself, as well as have some kind of following which aided in the performance of the ritual. The only exceptions were a few minor rituals detailed in the book, like the one which determined the Strain of a Leviathan. These had been devised by ritualists in the distant past specifically to draw upon the shared blood of Leviathans. The problem was that primordial sorcery hinged upon manifesting the Leviathan's own authority over the world, as opposed to calling upon a desired state - like wizarding magic - or the authority of a Dreaming God, as in theurgic rituals and as the mindset of each Leviathan was different, their sorcery and abilities manifested differently and in separate ways.

Equipped with this knowledge, Harry whiled away the days between classes with attempts to create something of his own, a sorcery that he could use to protect Hermione and himself from the Headmaster's magic. He had overheard one of the older students talking about Legilimency, a form of magic that allowed one to enter the mind of another and, while he doubted that such magic would affect him, given that he wasn't truly human, there was a chance that it would and, after all, his friend was as human as they came.

The difficulty was knowing where to start, though. Wizarding books were of little help, given that they operated on a different system to the one which he hoped to make use of. The forms of magic which had the closest connection to the celestial signs and portents which influenced primordial sorcery were Potions - which Harry had little understanding of and whose teacher seemed to harbour a deep-seated hatred for him - and Divination, a subject taught by a seer who was as close to Sightless as one could be without having no talent in prophecy at all.

It was hard going, but nearly three weeks later (and after he had finally told all to Hermione, a process which had involved a great deal of tears, choked confessions and finally relief as she had, instead of abandoning him, demanded that he let her help with his 'project') they had a ritual which Harry knew, from some unknown instinct, would work. It was a magic intended to let him find a person or a thing, no matter where they went. It was simple, requiring little more than a bowl, some water, a little of his blood and something of whatever was to be found. He didn't know what he would ever use it for, but he couldn't shake the feeling that he would need it, somehow, somewhen.

All that remained was to actually test it, which would require others to help, people who would do as he said and would aid in the ritual.

And so it was that the leviathan and the witch found themselves on the shore of the Black Lake on the night of the full moon, intending to call on the merpeople to help them.

* * *

 **A/N:** To the guest reviewer who calls themselves Darthas, I've significantly changed the Wake so that it's an effect whose power builds up over time and with Harry's exercise of his powers and nature. At the current point in the story, his Wake is extremely weak, capable of little more than inducing a shadow of fear and awe in those around him. It won't be capable of producing Beloved for a while yet. It will be eventually, though. That said, I have been considering having wizards have a resistance to the Wake instead, meaning that when Harry returns to the muggle world, he'll have to deal with those issues (although having a refuge from the Dursleys might make that worth it, for him). What do you think?

On a side note, for those to whom this means anything, Harry is incredibly lucky in that Hermione is in fact an Atoll. Or unlucky, depending on your point of view.


End file.
